Dubai: The coach of Al Madam Sports and Cultural Club is confident the UAE can have at least one archer and a medal from the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.
Mujahid Adam from Sudan was hand-picked by Dr Saeed Al Ketbi from Al Madam Club from his coaching job in Thailand and asked to prepare a squad of archers from the club with a future Olympic Games in mind.
Since the past two years, Adam has been dedicated to spreading the lesser-known sport like archery. And today he has a group of nearly 150 cadet archers and a dozen more in the senior category.
“Their level of shooting is quite high when compared to international performances. We have more than 12 who have managed to scale into the senior category. There is so much of natural talent in these athletes, and I am confident that if we continue this development programme the UAE can surely have at least one or two archers and a medal at the next Olympic Games in Japan,” Adam confided.
Luckily for the young coach from Sudan, the UAE National Olympic Committee (UAE NOC) included archery into their annual UAE School Olympic Games since the past two years. “And this has further helped us to bring in the competitive element that is so essential for athletes in that age group. Everything has been going as per plans and I am confident of achieving the goals set before us,” he added.
But among the priorities before Adam is a fruitful participation at the 2018 Youth Olympic Games to be staged in Argentina. “The next two years are very important in the development of our archers. We need to build up for the Youth Games, and if everything goes on well in Argentina then we can easily have a medallist from the UAE during the Tokyo Games,” he hoped.
